When you gotta go, you gotta go. But where should you go? Mizpee.com is a useful Web site that tells you everything you need to know about public toilets near you. Type in an address and the site will locate the closest public toilets, with distance, rating and whether a purchase is required. You can even get the info text messaged to you on your cell phone and add your own 2 cents by reviewing a facility. The pull-down menus of states and cities are limited -- in some states,...

When you gotta go, you gotta go. But where should you go? Mizpee.com is a useful Web site that tells you everything you need to know about public toilets near you. Type in an address and the site will locate the closest public toilets, with distance, rating and whether a purchase is required. You can even get the info text messaged to you on your cell phone and add your own 2 cents by reviewing a facility. The pull-down menus of states and cities are limited -- in some states,...

BEIJING-Travelers to China may be heartened to know that help is on the way for one of the most urgent of human conditions. Two government ministries were ordered this month to built 1,000 public "supertoilets" in major cities by 1996. The loos are to be manned by attendants and equipped with toilet paper, mirrors, wash basins and-good news for Westerners-even doors on the stalls. A spokesman for the Ministry of Construction said the best public toilet design will be determined by...

TRAVEL WARNINGS, ETC.: When traveling abroad, it's always smart to check the U.S. State Department's Web site for updates on safety and security in the country you're visiting. But the department's classifications for travel warnings and alerts have always been a bit confusing. What's a "consular information sheet," anyway, and how does it differ from a "public announcement"? Now the department has made the system easier to understand: - General reports on current conditions in all countries (formerly called...

As CTA train commuters encounter increased delays, riders needing to use the restroom have no choice but to hold it in. That's nothing new. "For at least the last 30 years, the [rail station] restrooms have been for use by CTA employees only," said transit agency spokeswoman Noelle Gaffney. "The CTA does not have the resources to update, maintain and monitor the facilities." At the CTA, where the stench of urine in some train station stairwells and at bus shelters is a chronic...

On the Western front of the nation's public restroom revival, even the homeless sometimes fear entering the bathroom. David Mals, 49, who considers himself an expert on lavatories after seven years of homelessness, says it's not the futuristic design that Seattle has chosen -- a cylindrical structure that resembles an elevator to nowhere, with stainless steel doors that open as if on "Star Trek" -- that daunts him. Rather, it's how this...

Would-be visitors to China will be relieved to learn that public toilets in Beijing are to be upgraded. Whoever is in charge of such things in the People's Republic has reached the sound conclusion that smelly, hole-in-the-floor places offering little privacy and no running water are a turnoff that hurts China's image as a modernizing nation. "Beijing needs prettier restrooms," said Mayor Li Qitan, quoted by the Associated Press. "The living standards of the masses have been improving,...

As mounting slow zones and track work push up commuting times on Chicago Transit Authority rail lines, many riders are worrying about reaching their destinations without having an accident -- and they're not talking about a train derailment. "Has anyone thought about the fact that people's bladders and bowels may not stand the travel times?" asked C.F., a North Side man who wrote to Getting Around. "I know it's an ugly question, but the consequences will be a lot uglier if public...

I am often criticized for writing immature "bathroom" humor, and not enough about important topics. So today I'm going to write about a major international event that will take place next Wednesday through Friday in Beijing, China: The World Toilet Summit. The summit was brought to my attention by alert reader Marc Howell, who alerted me to the World Toilet Organization, a group dedicated to improving the world's public toilets, with a Web site at worldtoilet.org. ("Org" is a sound made by many of...

As CTA train commuters encounter increased delays, riders needing to use the restroom have no choice but to hold it in. That's nothing new. "For at least the last 30 years, the [rail station] restrooms have been for use by CTA employees only," said transit agency spokeswoman Noelle Gaffney. "The CTA does not have the resources to update, maintain and monitor the facilities." At the CTA, where the stench of urine in some train station stairwells and at bus shelters is a chronic...

As mounting slow zones and track work push up commuting times on Chicago Transit Authority rail lines, many riders are worrying about reaching their destinations without having an accident -- and they're not talking about a train derailment. "Has anyone thought about the fact that people's bladders and bowels may not stand the travel times?" asked C.F., a North Side man who wrote to Getting Around. "I know it's an ugly question, but the consequences will be a lot uglier if public...

Whether they call it a victory for porcelain proportionality, squatters' rights or potty parity, wait-weary women--and their impatient male companions--are greeting a new city restroom-equity law here with a deep sigh of relief. New York City is the latest in a lineup of several municipalities, including Chicago, and more than 20 states where problems with public privies have prompted politicians to provide facilities...

China celebrated World Environment Day Wednesday by giving its people a preview of a rarely seen device: modern public toilets. An exhibition at the Museum of the Chinese Revolution on Tiananmen Square depicts a future in which human waste, China's main fertilizer, will be gathered from flushless toilets in plastic bags for manure on the fields. In a country where even the last emperors used gilded pots or ceramic bottles and peasants still use outhouses, the news of modern...

Letter writer Hosea L. Martin suggests that municipalities might charge for toilet permit cards as a kind of guarantee that the restrooms of restaurants and other businesses won't be misused by the permit holders ("Toilet privileges," Voice of the people, Feb. 27) . Would these permits then become another mandatory tax on all of Chicago's tourists as well? When my son and I visited Venice a few years ago, a city where one waits in long lines and pays fees to use the public toilets, we took to carrying a map of...

TRAVEL WARNINGS, ETC.: When traveling abroad, it's always smart to check the U.S. State Department's Web site for updates on safety and security in the country you're visiting. But the department's classifications for travel warnings and alerts have always been a bit confusing. What's a "consular information sheet," anyway, and how does it differ from a "public announcement"? Now the department has made the system easier to understand: - General reports on current conditions in all countries (formerly called...

I am often criticized for writing immature "bathroom" humor, and not enough about important topics. So today I'm going to write about a major international event that will take place next Wednesday through Friday in Beijing, China: The World Toilet Summit. The summit was brought to my attention by alert reader Marc Howell, who alerted me to the World Toilet Organization, a group dedicated to improving the world's public toilets, with a Web site at worldtoilet.org. ("Org" is a sound made by many of...

Four years ago, when Bill and Hillary Clinton and their various friends, family and hangers-on made their triumphant walk to the Democratic National Convention at Madison Square Garden to claim the nomination for the presidency, they walked right past one of the city's newest and most interesting sidewalk attractions: a toilet. It was discreetly enclosed in a Victorian-style kiosk, but it was a toilet, nonetheless. The inconspicuous commode was part of the city's experiment...

Spreading a floor plan on his desk, real-estate agent Tony Wood reels off the selling points of his most interesting property. "It's an Edwardian building, with lots of original features," he says. These include the red-brick walls and quaint arched windows. It's also a former public restroom. The word "lavatories" is engraved in the side of the building in large block letters. "Gents" and "Ladies" signs are still on the doors. "It isn't being used as a toilet anymore," Wood explains.